Bosque Ecosystem Vegetation Monitoring and Data Analysis

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The Bureau of Reclamation is seeking ongoing support of the Bosque Ecosystem Monitoring Program (BEMP) to fund the services of three professional botanists to continue measuring plant species distribution and cover at BEMP’s 22 monitoring sites in the Middle Rio Grande bosque (riparian forest) between Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo and Lemitar, a distance of 280 km (174 miles). Half of the BEMP sites in this reach are within the Albuquerque Reach. Work to be performed between mid-August and mid-September. The assessment will be done according to BEMP protocol which is a long-term monitoring program based on science and outreach. It began in 1997, as a joint effort between Bosque School and the Department of Biology at the University of New Mexico (UNM). BEMP was designed to be a model for agencies and other organizations planning to set up and implement their own or collaborative long-term monitoring of fundamental ecosystem processes that underlie riparian sustainability. The BEMP model enables the causes and effects of spatial and temporal change in riparian habitats and species populations to be better understood and more adaptively managed than if monitoring were short-term and inconsistent. Regular monitoring of plant community change in the Middle Rio Grande bosque is an effective way of understanding the causes and effects of the forces driving such change.

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